Cradle of Humanity

The term Cradle of Humanity seems to have originated in Mesopotamia in the second century where it was used by early Arab Christians to refer to a geographic are/a that falls within a 1,000 mile radius of the spot they believed to be the birthplace of humankind. Since then, the term is used not only in religious, but also in secular and scientific contexts, and may therefore refer to different locations, depending on the religious, secular or scientific views of the user.

The consensus among biologists and paleontologists is that mankind evolved through natural processes, and some currently use the term to refer to sites in East Africa, where the oldest hominid fossils were found in 1974. Subsequent work done on the basis of mitochondrial DNA in 1987 strengthened this "out of Africa" theory. Within the past two years, however, several groups of prominent paleontologists have begun to challenge East Africa's position as the evolutionary "cradle of humanity", most notably due to recent research in connection with the Liujiang hominid of China, the Dmanisi fossils of Georgia and the Mungo Man fossils in Australia.

Jewish, Christian and Muslim creationists believe that man was created by God in a garden called "Eden"; among them, some early Christians (A.D second century) used the term to refer to a geographic area covering lands that fall within a 1,000 mile radius of a location they believed corresponded to one described in the Bible book of Genesis as the birthplace of mankind.

By the arrival of the Ottoman period (1516–1918), the term had become well accepted throughout the majority of the empire, which extended into parts of southern Europe and exerted much cultural influence for over 400 years. Early in the nineteenth century, Protestant missionaries began to arrive in the region and found that the term provided a common ground for introducing their teachings to the local population.

For several years thereafter, many evolutionists suspected that the "cradle of humanity" was located somewhere in southwest Europe, even though Darwin, personally, always favored Africa as the most likely site.

Due to apparent prejudices of the predominantly British paleontological hierarchy at the time, Homo erectus was not immediately accepted in 1894 as a valid hominid. Hence, it was only about a decade later, following the turn of the century, after fossilized remains attributable to Homo erectus had been found also in South Africa, Asia, England and China (with subsequent, smaller, matching finds popping up just about everywhere in Africa, Asia, and Europe), that the consensus of evolutionary opinion shifted its focus to Southeast Asia as the possible "cradle of humanity".

Because he failed to justify the fossil as a new species by describing its unique anatomical features, leading paleoanthropologists of the day refused to accept it as a valid hominid. By 1920, however, this find contributed to the formulation of new theories (see chronospecies and anagenesis) more in keeping with Darwin's original assumptions that the "cradle of humanity" may well be in Africa, though several also viewed it as confirmation of the then prevailing view (represented by powerful names like Othenio Abel and Arthur Keith) that the ancestors of humans would be found in Europe.

The 1924 South African discovery of Australopithecus africanus at Taung was named by Raymond Dart, a pioneer of paleontology, who created quite a stir by suggesting that the material was a hominid. The hostile response from his peers caused Dart to abandon excavations at Taung. Nevertheless, his use of both Latin("australo") and Greek("pithecus") in naming the specimen resulted in a change from the use of the prefix "Homo" to describe every hominid discovery. Since then, the new genus-label created by Dart has become accepted as the designation to be used for the entire group of early hominids found in Africa.

By 1939, possibly as a reaction to the racial extremism developing in Central Europe and in the light of other new discoveries in Africa, the Australopithecus africanus material was reevaluated and some evolutionary experts slowly began to consider South Africa as another possible option for the "cradle of humanity".

Although eminent scientist, Dr. Robert Broom, commonly receives the credit for discovering and naming Australopithecus robustus, the find had actually been made by a young schoolboy named Gert Terblanche at Kromdraaii, South Africa in 1938. Broom later found several more cranial and mandibular fragments that came to be associated with A. robustus. Broom published the results of his extensive research on the australopithecines in 1946, which marked a crucial turning point for South Africa in the eyes of the global evolutionary community × establishing it as the new "cradle of humanity".

Although the 1959 discovery by Mary Leakey of a specimen known as OH5 or "Zinj" is considered by many the watershed in paleoanthropological history, this Olduvai, Tanzania, find, which later became known as Australopithecus boisei did not affect prevailing views regarding the location of the "cradle of humanity" the way Homo habilis did only a year later.

Estimated, at the time of its discovery in 1960, to be approximately one million years older than Australopithecus robustus, the Homo habilis find created a bit of a problem: The name given to it literally means "handy man", and was chosen because of the collection of stone tools that were discovered near the specimens. Further, its height and brain size were smaller than those of the australopithecines, and it appeared to be less robust. In other words, this older specimen seemed more advanced than comparatively recent ones.

While the role of Homo habilis in human evolution is still not settled, its discovery by the distinguished team of Louis Leakey, John Napier, and Phillip Tobias did result in Tanzania being regarded as the "cradle of humanity" for at least two decades.

In 1974 Donald Johanson found the famous "Lucy", the most complete skeleton of an australopithecine. Together with Timothy White, Johanson named the specimen Australopithecus afarensis, which resulted in heavy objections from their peers. By the end of 1980, the heated dispute seems to have been settled and Australopithecus afarensis was widely accepted as a new human ancestor.

Dated at almost four million years old, A. afarensis became the oldest hominid fossil on record, granting Ethiopia the position as the new "cradle of humanity".

After Nelson Mandela became president of South Africa1994 the fossils of South Africa became more accessible to the public, with a new Cradle of Humankind (World Heritage Site) named in 2000. Current fossil excavations include 2.5 million year old Australopithecus africanus specimens (originally discovered in 1924×see As of 1939 above) as well as the Australopithecus robustus material (discovered between 1938 and 1946×see As of 1946 above).

The Cradle of Humankind exhibit is intended to be the showplace also for any future evolutionary discoveries that may appear in South Africa.

The discovery has not only confused the consensus on time and place for the divergence of the evolutionary lines of humans and chimpanzees, but, due to the location of the find in the Sahel region, a semiarid zone of mid-west Africa that separates the Sahara from the southern tropical forests, it has also led to the suggestion that the "cradle of humanity" may have been more in central or western Africa.

Meanwhile, other evolutionary scientists, particularly some prominent paleoanthropologists, have begun to consider the possibility that humans may have evolved simultaneously on several continents along parallel evolutionary lines, finally engaging in trans-continental migration and interbreeding at the stage of Homo erectus or even later. Proponents of these theories consider the discussion on a single evolutionary "cradle of humanity" impractical and irrelevant.

Considering this untidy history in the use of the term, many evolutionists now shy away from expressly designating any specific location as the "cradle of humanity". Nevertheless, those who use the phrase politically, frequently refer to evolutionary use of the expression at one time or another to support their application of it to a particular geo-political region.

"A river watering the garden flowed from Eden, and from there it divided. It had four headstreams. The name of the first is Pishon. It winds through the entire land of Havilah, where there is gold. The gold of that land is good; aromatic resin and onyx are also there. The name of the second river is Gihon; it winds through the entire land of Cush. The name of the third river is Tigris; it runs along the east side of Asshur. And the fourth river is the great river Euphrates."

These words describe rivers which still exist and flow today in much the same way as they flowed when Genesis was written. Second century Christians thus identified the location of Eden at a point that, today, would be just west of the border between Iraq and Iran and just above the northern shore of the Persian Gulf.

A few isolated denominations of Christendom still appear to use the term, nowadays, as a nickname for "Eden" and when they do, the expression is usually capitalized as Cradle of Humanity.
Despite this apprently "Christian" background, the term "Cradle of Humanity" seems to be more heavily used among Muslims, who tend to accept the 1,000 mile limit from "Eden" as the boundary for the area. This may stem from the use of the phrase during the period of the Ottoman Empire, a major force for expansion of Islam, when most of the territories in the general vicinity of the area converted from Christianity to Islam.

Some cultural historians in the self-described "Cradle of Humanity States" (see map above) also find the thinking behind the terms Near East, Middle East and Far East offensive, since they are vestiges of British colonialism; a period when such expressions where coined based on the distance between England and the region in question. They often argue that, unlike the West Indies, where the present dominant culture was indeed largely formed under the influence of the colonizing powers, most of the dominant culture in so-called Near, Middle and Far East lands, predated the colonials and has actually survived their sometimes destructive influence.

Some scholars subscribe to the view that, in spite of the termÒs inaccuracy from the standpoint of evolutionary biology, the regionÒs influences on language, culture and religion may well justify its preferred use over the controversial term "Middle East", which, from a geographical point of view, seems somewhat out of place. In their quest for a "regional identity", residents of the region also seem to take comfort in the fact that the name "Cradle of Humanity" was given to the area by local people, rather than outsiders, and that its meaning has not changed from the original understanding of its formulators in over eighteen centuries.